DAlthough her family has to endure various tests every day-a pandemic, without electricity for three months, now there is no running water for several days, because the storm Philomena froze the pipes and left in the lingering snow Madrid-Sara Benayad has not forgotten the importance of hospitality.
She would welcome those forces to join her new ritual, because the lack of water forced her into this new ritual. Every night before going to bed, Benayad fills a pan and bucket with snow. The next morning, he must melt the snow on a gas stove so that there is water to wash and wash dishes.
“I really hope that anyone responsible for this will come and spend the night with us,” she said. “We are honored to have them. They can sleep in my house, suffer, and live our lives. Maybe then they will do something.”
Philomena brings Madrid the biggest snow in 50 years, Took the lives of four people, tore their limbs from tens of thousands of trees, and accomplished the rare feat of leaving the capital in a cold, suspended animation state.
But no place in Spain has been hit as mercilessly as the Royal Canadians. Shanty town 12 kilometers from the center of Madrid This is the home of Benayad and 8,500 other people, most of whom are of Moroccan or Roma descent.
Since the beginning of October, 4,500 people living in the 5th and 6th districts of Europe’s largest informal settlement Never had powerThe electricity supplier Naturgy stated that it has never cut off the power supply to Cañada Real and attributed the power outage to the huge waves in these two sectors, which means that the network was forced to shut down for security reasons.
It stated that although there are approximately 1,500 houses in the area, there are only four registered users in the two sectors, adding that it continues to provide electricity despite the “serious economic losses” caused by illegal use of the electricity supply.
The local government of Madrid stated that the reason for the surge was that the cannabis plantations in shanty towns had been connected to the supply and consumed so much electricity that the system tripped again and again.
People in Districts 5 and 6 disputed these claims, but said they were irrelevant. They said the lack of electricity puts their lives — and the lives of 1,800 children in the area — at serious risk. If the previous situation was desperate, Filomena has brought Cañada Real to the edge.
“We have gone through a lot of difficult times here,” said Beatriz Aragón, a doctor who has been working in the town since 2007. “We had a lot of fires and floods, but they happened and then they stopped. We have had winter power outages before. But we have never seen anything like this.”
The death of a 74-year-old man People living in District 6 have led to legal complaints against the authorities, and Aragon said that 40 to 50 people have suffered carbon monoxide poisoning due to the use of butane heaters by affordable people.
“We saw children with frostbite because their hands were destroyed by cold and respiratory infections,” the doctor said.
“But the most worrying thing is how all this will Covid third wave. Yesterday a family told me that they had no way to keep warm, so they shared a bed with their daughter who had a fever. “If we don’t do this, we will freeze,” they said. Encountering this situation in a pandemic is just a perfect storm. “
Aragón and her colleagues have always advised mothers and babies who can stay with relatives elsewhere to leave Cañada Real until the temperature starts to rise. “This is not something you want to do during a pandemic, but you have to choose between what is bad and what will be worse.”
Aura Morales, working for social education institutions Barro Association, She was equally straightforward in assessing the damage suffered by the young residents of the town. “If there is no electricity, everything will get worse,” she said. “Some children are doing homework in a cold car so they can see what they are doing.”
When schools in the area were closed due to snow, other children used their parents’ phones to keep up with their lessons. These phones have a dual purpose: once the lesson is downloaded, the built-in flashlight can be used so that children can see what they are writing after the sun goes down.
Loubna El Azmani, a community worker who lives in District 6 with her family, said that people in the town are doing their best to explain their desperate situation to the outside world.
“We have demonstrated and written and reported the situation to the authorities,” she said. “Everyone knows what’s going on here, but no one wants to react. But they need to be there before a greater tragedy occurs.”
Towards the end of December, a group of UN special rapporteurs Call on the Spanish government to ensure that electricity is restored immediately, Warning: “The lack of electricity not only violates these children’s right to adequate housing, but also has a very serious impact on their health, food, water, sanitation and education rights.”
However, the problem is that the responsibilities of Real Madrid in Canada are shared by the three local city halls (including the Madrid City Hall), the Madrid regional government and the central government’s representative in the region.
Between the slowly thawing ice drops, the locals vowed that they could hear the passing of stags again.
Nearly four years after signing resettlement agreements for hundreds of families, the regional government and Madrid City Hall have resettled 130 families.
As the local government spokesperson pointed out, this is a gradual process. “Our idea is to spread the family across the area so you don’t end up with more slums,” he said. “It’s very complicated – it’s not like buying cars and putting them in the garage; it’s about finding homes for people.”
At the same time, the city and local governments have been providing residents with emergency shelters and butane tanks to help them get through Philomena and its consequences. According to the Madrid City Hall, only two of the 17 families identified as particularly vulnerable have accepted the offer to move to the shelter.
Some residents said they rejected the offer because they were afraid of mixing up with other people during the COVID-19 pandemic and did not understand why they provided temporary accommodation when all they wanted was electricity.
As the wait continued, the children of Cañada Real did what they did in the snow. Young people make snowmen, throw snowballs, and slide down the frozen dam with garbage bags. Older people throw cardboard on a makeshift bonfire for a few seconds to warm or bump, realizing that they will be warmer when running around than indoors.
The elderly residents of the town found it difficult to deal with the lack of power, both literally and figuratively.
“Morale is low,” said Benayad, who quit her job in the recycling business a month ago to take care of her family. “This is a national shame-it happened in a developed country Europe 2021. “
She added that if the authorities really want people to leave Cañada Real, they need to provide a clear solution.
“According to the way things are going, the only person they can manage to get out of here is the dead.”
Additional report by Pablo García Sacristán
